Page 129 of The Hitman's Secret Baby
Luca rises slowly. The fire flickers against the lines of his face.
"Who?" Luca asks, his voice like frost cracking across stone.
I exhale slowly, fingers curling tighter around the worn edge of the report I brought back, now folded in my coat like something shameful. "Not Vasco. He didn't know. But someone high enough to access routes. Tags. Movements." I meet his eyes as I say it. "Someone close."
Luca's gaze sharpens for half a second before he turns away.
He walks toward the window with the kind of slow, deliberate steps that have always unnerved men more than shouting ever could.
The fire behind him throws his shadow long across the polished floor, and for a moment, he looks like a statue carved from rage and calculation, every angle chiseled to remind the world what power used to look like when it didn't beg for permission.
He says nothing for a moment, just stares out across the garden, where the hedges rise like silent witnesses and the olive trees whisper with wind they shouldn't feel. The estate has always held its breath before he makes a decision.
Then, quietly, like a blade unsheathing in the dark, he murmurs, "He waited. Waited for years. And now he sends rats through my walls."
The words carry no emotion, but I hear it beneath them. The insult. The old fury buried beneath years of silent triumph. The idea that someone could crawl back from the grave and dismantle his house from within burns hotter than any betrayal ever could.
I step forward, boots muffled by the thick rug underfoot. The air feels thick with the past. I've stood in this room for a hundred judgments, a thousand quiet decrees that reshaped the city without ever speaking above a whisper. But this is different. This is not about business or street disputes or smuggling routes.
This is about legacy.
"We find the leak," I say, low and certain, "and we stop it."
Luca turns slowly, his expression unreadable, but I see the fire reflected in his eyes now. Not from the hearth. From somewhere deeper. The kind of fire that does not ask if it should burn, only when.
"And if the leak is family?" he asks.
I do not answer right away. Not because I don't know. But because the truth has too many knives. If the leak is family, we do what we've always done. "We bleed for it, and we bury it."
The stone corridor breathes with cold as I step out of Luca's study, the firelight still searing behind my eyes, the report now committed to memory and nothing more. The door clicks shut behind me, quiet as a knife.
Then I hear footsteps, followed by a voice, high and tight with panic. "Dad!"
I turn just as Gabriel barrels down the hall toward me, his small body throwing itself into mine, arms wrapping around my waist. His face is blotched with tears, his breath jagged.
"She's gone!" he cries, voice raw and trembling. "Mama's gone!"
The words slam into my chest.
I crouch fast,gripping his arms, my pulse already roaring in my ears. "Gabriel. Breathe. What do you mean gone?"
He shakes his head hard, curls clinging to his cheeks. "I woke up and she wasn't there. I looked everywhere. I called and called and she didn't come. She never leaves me. Never."
I scoop him into my arms and rise, my stride already lengthening down the hall. My jaw locks so tight I feel the ache rattle through my teeth. She wouldn't leave him. Not like this. Not without a trace.
Something is wrong.
I storm through the lower levels, pushing open the door to the south house myself, ignoring the startled guard near the threshold. Gabriel clings to me, silent now except for his breathing. Inside, the lights are still on. The blanket she tucked around him is crumpled. Her coat still hangs on the hook by the door.
No signs of struggle. No note. No sign of a woman who left willingly.
I don't waste time.
Back through the halls, past the arched windows that mirror the dead garden outside, I carry Gabriel straight to the main house. Luca is still in the drawing room, his fingers curled around a glass of dark liquor he hasn't yet touched. He looks up, brows drawn.
"She's missing," I say, the words cutting like gravel. "Gabriel woke alone. No one has seen her."
Luca's stare sharpens. "You think she ran?"
